Personal Blogs

Do not let me be too rich or too poor. 

Give me only as much food as I need each day.

Proverbs 30:8

A special thanks to Matthieu for his image at https://unsplash.com/@mathieustern

Every week I see folk lining up at my local supermarket Customer Services to buy their lottery tickets. I guess as they stand in line, they dream of what they would do if they won.

What would you do with the money if you were a winner? I suppose the old house is looking tired and a new house would do. Perhaps that holiday you always dreamed of. A top of the range car.

The big question I ask you; would you be any happier? Would you sleep like Don Quixote? I read that winning the lottery can be counterproductive to hippieness.  

There was a man in ancient times who was a winner in a material sense. It was King Solomon. He was a young man when he took the throne and God asked him what he could do for Solomon. This youthful king asked for wisdom to rule God’s people, a noble request,

“So please give me a wise mind that understands things well. Then I will be able to rule your people properly. I will know the difference between right things and wrong things. I will only be able to rule this great nation of your people if you do that for me.” I Kings 3:9.

Well, God gave him wisdom. But, because of his humble desire, God gave him riches. He had gold, art, lavish buildings, a lavish palace, the pick of the most beautiful women in the kingdom and everything that money could buy. But it all went wrong.

One of God’s greatest gifts to man is free will.; the right to choose our own sojourn on this earthly stay. We can gain knowledge, but that depends how we use it. Wisdom is the application of knowledge. It is knowledge to know that a tomato is a fruit, but it is wisdom to refrain from chopping it into a fruit salad.

Solomon ruled wisely for a time, but his life went pear shaped when he stopped applying the knowledge and married wives that served false gods. He lost God’s favour. Fortunately, he turned around before his death and imparted one of the most profound words in scripture,

 ^“Now I have heard everything, and this is what I have decided: Respect God and obey his commands. That is God's purpose for all people. ¹⁴ Remember that God will judge everything that we do, to see if it is good or it is bad. He knows even the things that we do secretly.” Ecclesiastes 12:13,14.

Solomon's experience teaches all humans a valuable lesson in life: no matter how much we have, we will always want more. That distraction becomes a god.

There is no greater prize that life everlasting, the gift God gives to the faithful.

“Scripture quotations are from the Easy English Bible Copyright © Mission Assist 2019 - Charitable Incorporated Organisation 1162807. Used by permission. All rights reserved.”

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Proverbs 27:17

Image kindly provided by https://unsplash.com/@raphaeldas

The art of travel is only a branch of the art of thinking

                                                        Mary Wollstonecraft

On Travel Writing

I awoke early; that time when thoughts rush in and fill the senses with sharp anxiety. It was June 24, the Ayrshire forecast of sunshine and dark cloud reflected the conflicting mood of the nation. ‘The British people have voted to leave the European Union, and their will must be respected.’ The politician’s carefully written statement sent shock waves throughout Europe. It was like living in a village after the Vikings had raided.

A film emerged, a captured memory in time that took me back to July 1995 and a sleepy little village tucked away in the small commune of Målsryd. A Swedish girl who had been my daughter’s pen-pal since youth, visited us in ‘94 and her family wished to reciprocate the hospitality. I never needed much persuasion to accept. I was fourteen when I first fell for the country. The influence of my teacher who painted images alongside the music of Sibelius and Grieg created a love affair with a mistress I never met. Unlike the poet, Yeats, I am not rooted in this ‘perpetual place’ where I grew up. No, Scandinavia affected me in such a way that it felt like my proper home; an emotion the Germans call fernweh, the strange and paradoxical longing for a place never visited.

So, we spent the year learning Swedish and on July 16, before sunrise, we packed up the Ford Granada with the usual tartan kitsch; a tin of shortbread, Tartan Special Ale, placemats, and a bottle of Laphroaig and made our way to the North Shields Ocean Terminal to board the Princess of Scandinavia for the overnight journey with a plan to stay a few days with Elisabeth’s family and then tour the country, including Stockholm.

Our onboard cabin was the size of a box room with four bunks. After some negotiating, my wife and I had the lower bunks whilst my son and daughter slept on top. We then set out to survey the vast vessel with a sense of excitement and finally to emerge on the top deck to watch the North-East coastline disappear in the wake.

The family went to explore the shop while I retired to a cosy corner in the sitting area to get more sense of the culture by reading Ingmar Bergman’s, The Magic Lantern.

Some of the Swedes looked eager to communicate. A look, a smile, a nod. I hadn’t been this popular since my adopted family received me back in ‘56. Likely they were suffering from vemod; a pensive melancholy triggered, on this occasion, by post-vacation blues. By clinging to a Brit, they were prolonging the adventure like a nicotine addict has that ‘last’ cigarette.

Collective roars emerged from the lounge. Sweden was beating Bulgaria in the FIFA World Cup. The mood among the Swedes was one of… well, overlyckliga (overjoyed). Swedes are characterised by the social mores of lagome (not too much, not too little). Overjoyed in their culture would amount to a subdued euphoria as no one dare stand out in the crowd. Myth reports that lagome originated from the Vikings. The celebratory horn filled with mead would be passed around and partook in such a way that every Norseman took only his fair share. Lagome presses in on modern culture and dictates that no one dare overdo it. Unlike the Midwestern Swedes in Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion who see their women as strong, men handsome and children, above average, the fatherland natives modestly bottle such pretentiousness as they would a jar of lingonberry preserve. I feel a deep respect for such modesty in a world where positive values are on a downhill piste.

I wondered if we, raised in the second city of the empire, would have traits that would appear strange to Swedes. As a child, my mother would step on a bus, lay her shopping down, turn to everyone on the bus and sigh, saying, ‘that’s been me all day’. Immediately, a conversation would begin, with strangers participating enthusiastically, behaviour that would make Swedes freeze with social anxiety, I’m assured. I wonder with my confident extroversion if I can irritate foreigners in the same way a loud tourist at the breakfast table in a Highland B & B can vex me. It was time for self-reflection. Other cultures teach us who we are. Their characteristics, like a raised mirror, help us compare ourselves, our values, albeit we look through the glass darkly.

Writing:  © 2024 Jim McCrory

“Compassion is the most important, 

perhaps the sole law of human existence.”

 Dostoevsky

Image courtesy of https://unsplash.com/@vincentvanzalinge

" If I cannot find compassionate people in society,

 I will find them in a book."

A friend asked me, “Who is your favourite character in literature?”

   “Oh, that’s a difficult one; it’s like deciding who your favourite child is,” I replied. “But, let me think… there’s Lucy Pevensie in Narnia, Boo Radley in Mockingbird, Hans Huberman in Book Thief and then I read Striped Pyjamas last year and Bruno impressed me.”

   “Your favourite, Jim?”

   “Okay, Prince Myshkin.”

   “Prince who?”

   “Prince Myshkin in Dostoevsky’s, The Idiot.”

   “Why him?”

    “Well, he was too good for this world.”

   “Come again?”

   “The story centres on Myshkin, who returns to St Petersburg after years convalescing in Switzerland with severe epilepsy. Although he’s a native of the city, he feels like an alien on his return; compassion was absent throughout the self-indulging society, and under his breath he uttered the condemnatory line, ‘Pass us by and forgive us our happiness.”’

I've always been interested in books that teach me compassion. If I cannot find compassionate people in society, I will find them in a book.

Writing:  © 2024 Jim McCrory

 “Watch the door of my lips” ― Psalm 141

Image courtesy of https://unsplash.com/@sergio_rola

If your mate, closest companion or family member was asked to give you marks out of ten regarding the quality of trust, what would they give you; ten being the highest? Ask someone who is not given to flattery and who is trustworthy by reputation. Would you be disappointed? It is a valuable wake-up call that should be treasured and taken seriously. “Watch the door of my lips” the wise man prays in Psalm 141.

Of all the words for “betrayal” in the world’s languages, the Japanese Uraguri (裏切り)

literally “cutting from behind", are the most expressive.  

There are always ones out there who will cut you from behind: the workplace, family and false friends and even those who claim a religious affiliation but prove false to its power. I believe the pain comes from the injustice of not being present to defend oneself. The hurt also arises when you trust someone enough to reveal some feelings and find out later that they have spread your confidential information and embellished the story. We shouldn’t have to say “please do not tell anyone” to consider it confidential. Privacy goes without saying. There are people in my past that have never come to know me and that’s because I am cautious and never open up to them because they have proved untrustworthy. It’s a pity. I believe we are on this earth to love our neighbour and betrayal is a violation of that principle of being human.

The Psalmist in Psalm 41 had much to say in this regard.

My enemies say with malice:

“When will he die and be forgotten?”

My visitor speaks falsehood;

he gathers slander in his heart;

he goes out and spreads it abroad.

All who hate me whisper against me;

they imagine the worst for me:

“A vile disease has been poured into him;

he will never get up from where he lies!”

Psalm 41: 5-8 (BSB).

Consider this, the person who gains the trust of others has crossed over to a level of maturity that gains the respect of others, and by extension, gains considerable self-respect and dignity.

Writing:  © 2024 Jim McCrory

Image  provided by https://unsplash.com/@seteph

You, stranger! Why have you taken up residence in my head? You surface when I walk in the woods, when I hear a song, when I lay in my quiet moments? You entered my life with the briefness of a falling snowflake. Yet, you hide in my vaults. Friendly ghosts from other lives. Our ephemeral moments are as detailed as a 17^th century Baroque painting. I ask, why are you there when all other fleeting occurrences dissolve in the liquid default of memory? Yet, you travel with me, shimmering in my consciousness like the gentle, mesmerising freshness of an energised snow globe. Transcending space and time, you share my passage in life.

1963: The Incongruity of Self-Awareness

I was six years old. You had this routine. Every Sunday at 11am, you would come round the back of my Govan tenement building and stand on a box. Wearing your bowtie and and suit jacket, you were out of place in a working men's environment; you looked like a music hall artist. You took a swig of wine and sang Mario Lanza’s Be My Love, a favourite song of my fathers. And every week, when you finished, my mother would open her purse, throw out some coins, close her purse and say, ‘why doesn’t that darn man not sing something new?’ she would say whilst wiping her eyes with her hanky.

“I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.”
― Abraham Lincoln

" For judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful.

 Mercy triumphs over judgment."

James 2:13 (BSB).

image by 

https://unsplash.com/@micmurph12

Every story has a hero’s journey, albeit hero is a loose term. Jack, who lacks some basic emotional intelligence, trades the family cow for a bag of magic beans. The beans end up being thrown out the window (Falling tension). The next morning there is a giant beanstalk.

Jack heads up the tree and meets the giant’s wife who is a kind woman that gives him some food. Remember, he had no breakfast, he cashed that in for the beanstalk.

Anyway, while enjoying the kind hospitality, he hears these words that had me shaking in my pyjamas as a kid, The rising tension,

“Fee-fi-fo-fum,
I smell the bones of an Englishman,
Be he alive, or be he dead
I'll grind his bones
to make my bread.”

Jack does a runner.

But, the sense of adventure gets a grip, and he returns. He grabs a bag of gold and a golden harp, chops the tree down and the happily ever after denouement that satisfies the needs of every child kick in. We all need that, the idea that justice has been served. But, and it's a big but: what happened to the giants wife? I guess that's what is called collateral damage. 

*****

Jonah, that Bible prophet that gets a free ride to Nineveh in a giant fish needed to learn a lesson about justice, mercy, and compassion.

Dare I say that Jonah was narrow minded? He isn’t happy, he’s in the true religion and sees no point in preaching to a nation of pagans. He does a runner, by taking a vessel that goes in the opposite direction to Benidorm, Ibiza, Balearics or somewhere there abouts. No prosecco and paella for Jonah though. God intervenes and hampers his plans by bringing on a storm. The sailors blame Jonah for bringing on God’s intervention and they throw him overboard.

Three days later, Jonah’s free cruise takes him to Nineveh. He goes into the city and delivers God’s message. Forty days they must repent. Repent from what you may ask? Violence the Bible indicates.

The Ninevites fast and repent in no time. God grants them deliverance.

Jonah goes into a bit of a sulk with God. He did not like the decision. He thought they were undeserving of mercy. Look what God did next,

“Jonah was filled with anger, but the Lord gently asked him, "Do you have any right to be angry?"

“I am so angry, I want to die,” Jonah replied.

Still upset, Jonah left the city and found a spot to the east. There, he made himself a shelter, sitting in its shade, and waited to see what would happen to the city.

In his kindness, God provided a vine, making it grow into a parasol for Jonah and shading him from his discomfort. So there Jonah is, bathing in bliss. But at dawn the next day, God sends a parasite, and the vine withered. At sunrise, God sends a scorching east wind. Jonah feels like fainting.

 "It would be better for me to die than to live."

But God asked Jonah again, "Do you have the right to be angry about the vine?"

Jonah replied, "I do. I am so angry I could die."

God said to Jonah, “Do you have the right to be angry about the vine?”

 I do,” He replied.

God said “You have been concerned about this plant although you did not cultivate it or make it grow. It sprung up overnight… But here is this great city with more than 120,000 people who cannot tell the right hand from the left and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great City.”

Sometimes the hero’s journey is about learning something about yourself and changing. Jonah had a relationship with God, but he was stubborn, narrow minded; he needed to get deeper insight into Divine grace. He failed to temper justice and mercy. God’s compassion to Nineveh and Jonah is illuminating and it's not clear if the penny dropped for Jonah. But it’s a message to us and every reader. The religious leaders of Jesus day failed to apply the lesson. Many today act likewise. Some of the greatest acts of injustice has been performed by religious organisations. 

Jesus quoting Hosea said,

“It is not sacrifice I want. I desire mercy. Go ponder on that.”

Matthew 9:13.

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked,

nor stand on the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers

Psalm 1:1 (WEB)

My gratitude to Aaron for his Image  at https://unsplash.com/@aaronburden

Sometimes, just sometimes we can find ourselves in an environment that could be described as hostile. Perhaps I can use the expression passive hostility where you get a deep sense that the people or individuals you are with are aching for some kind reason to cause one harm.

Although committed in some way to be there, you wish to be somewhere else. You hold your tongue and exercise great care with your words less you are misconstrued or misquoted.

Gemütlichkeit, a German untranslatable that encompasses feelings of warmth, safety and social harmony were companions have your best interests at heart. As an empath, I have spent my life searching for friends that I can sit and break bread within social harmony. 

I desire everyone's happiness, but there is a responsibility on every person's part to self-analyse it is an important human characteristic that is scarce in today’s world. The psalmist cautions on the subtle progress one can take in choosing companionship. For example, walk with, stand with, then sit with.

Last night I met up with some friends online. The discussion we had centred on making the world a better place. What role can we play? we all asked ourselves. Some of the answers included the need for kindness, consideration, empathy, human affection, and the need to welcome the stranger. Apart from the positive qualities discussed, I felt that deep sense of Gemütlichkeit with those I was with.

Note: 

Note: "Breaking bread with someone" is a metaphor for building trust and fostering friendship in an environment of mutual respect.

"The Spanish girl in a museum suggested Don Quixote. 

A priest recommended The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis.

The Chinese student said, The Boy in the Stripped Pyjamas.

The Swedish man in Växjö, suggested The Immigrants."

https://unsplash.com/@jannerboy62

Will you please take your eyes off that bookshelf and concentrate what I am about to tell you? This is serious stuff.

I am a solitary kind of person who needs a minimum of contact outside the company of my home.

And one of life’s great pleasures is sitting in a quiet corner with a cup of tea. No ordinary tea: it must be of good quality. I do not drink or smoke, but I do like a good cup of tea and if Sainsbury's Gold is not available, I settle for Co-op 99. Am I boring you? I guess I am.

Anyway, back to books. I cannot help it, but if I see someone sitting on the beach or a park bench or a train and they are reading a book, I must ask them what they are reading.

Last year when I was visiting a town in the Scottish Highland, I watched a man sitting reading a book; fully lost in the moment. My wife and I went for a coffee and met a friend. Well, two hours later, there he was, still engrossed in that book. I could not help it, but I just had to know what revelations held that man so much that time stopped for him. It was some book by a comedian. I did not dare to ask my next question.

What book would you recommend to me?

You see, depending on what a person is reading, I usually ask, “Of all the books you have read, what book would you recommend to me that would teach me a valuable lesson in life?”

One Spanish girl in a museum suggested Don Quixote. A priest recommended The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis. The man that knocked my door when I was 23 years old recommended the Bible. The woman on the Croatian hovercraft suggested A Gentleman from Moscow. A young Chinese student excitedly willed me to read The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas and my Filipino wife recommended Noli Me Tangere ( Touch Me Not) by Jose Rizal. All good stuff that taught valuable lessons in life.

Now, what book would you the reader suggest that I read? Please tell me what country you are from and the name of the book.

Note: "Touch me not" were words spoken by the resurrected Jesus."

"Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." John 20:17 (KJB).

For the poor will never cease out of the land. Therefore, I command you to surely open your hand to your brother, to your needy, and to your poor, in your land. 

Deuteronomy 15:11 World English Bible

Image by https://unsplash.com/@towfiqu999999

If your religion is soliciting donations, where is the money going? Does the organisation specify in detail how the money is used?

If not, run! Do not turn back. Legally, they may not be obliged, but morally and ethically they are.

When the poor widow dropped the coin into the treasury at the temple, Jesus approved because it was done with the right heart condition. Besides, the upkeep of the temple was a God-given command. So, fair enough, religious buildings and meeting places require upkeep.

However, I read about religious leaders with their own planes. Others who fly first-class. And others who use the funding for completely selfish motives like foreign travel, the purchase of Rolex watches, cosying their ivory-tower nests and funding all sorts of material stuff whilst sincere adherents in developing countries struggle in life to support the cause.

The actions of such religions whether online or face-to-face are a blasphemy before God.

Whoever stops his ears at the cry of the poor, he will also cry out, but shall not be heard.

Proverbs 21:4

“All you who work hard! All you who carry heavy loads! 

Come to me! 

I will give you rest. 

Do what I tell you. Learn what I teach you. 

I am gentle. I am not proud. 

Then your hearts will rest. 

What I tell you to do is easy.

 What I give you to carry is not heavy.”

Matthew 11:28-30 (WEB).

Image by  https://unsplash.com/@david_di

There are many reasons why a person may be marginalised in society: disability, the challenge of being the minority in a foreign society. A female in a male dominated world and visa versa. Family estrangement. Religious estrangement. Autism and other conditions that make one misunderstood. loneliness, and many more issues unique to your own circumstances.

Have you ever read a story in the Bible multiple times and suddenly noticed something new? That happened to me last week as I was reading 2 Samuel.

Mephibosheth is a man who lived with a disability. He was the son of Jonathan and the grandson of King Saul. In the language of the Hebrew text, he was described as “lame.” His story begins when his caregiver, upon hearing the news of King Saul and Jonathan's deaths, hurriedly fled with Mephibosheth, accidentally dropping him. This caused injuries to his legs or feet, which were never properly treated. You can find this in 2 Samuel 4:4: “Jonathan had a son named Mephibosheth who became disabled after a fall.”

If you are familiar with this story, you know that later in 2 Samuel 9, King David, who wanted to honour someone from King Saul’s family, sought out Ziba, a former servant of Saul. Ziba informed him, “Jonathan has a son who is disabled.” Notably, Ziba did not even mention Mephibosheth’s name.

When Mephibosheth came before King David, he humbly acknowledged his lowly status, referring to himself as a “dead dog.” He felt utterly worthless. However, David reassured him, saying, “Do not be afraid, I will certainly show you kindness for your father Jonathan’s sake. I will give back to you all the land of your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table.”

This part of the story is already quite powerful. It is a moving depiction of grace and restoration: someone who was forgotten and marginalized is given a place of honour and belonging at the King’s table. This narrative holds profound meaning for our world today, particularly within the context of faith and the inclusion of people with disabilities and other marginalising problems. Jesus simply said, “Come to me!” Have you ever taken your cause of pain to Jesus? Why not do so.

Meanwhile, we who are Christians have a responsibility to care for the marginalised,

“Most certainly I tell you, because you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.” Matthew 11:30 (WEB).

Some marginalising methods are robbing a person of identity by making them invisible, ridiculing them, blaming them, humiliating them. Embarrassing them.

Image by https://unsplash.com/@fastturtle

Note From a Smaller Island: The Tree

The summer routine was always the same; eight weeks on the Island of Bute. A certain tree was always the first place I ventured whilst my mother unpacked and prepared the dusty, damp living spaces that reeked of libraries past combined with mushrooms.

The ash tree was in a woodland area where newfound friends and I would gravitate to; this was our joy, the temporary transformation to the feral from creatures formerly held in suburban captivity.

In spaces between its large, knotted, and knurled veins protruding from the earth like aged arthritic fingers, we would sit round the velvety moss carpet between.  We sat with our peers and  unprohibited and beyond the gaze of adults.

We boys, intrigued by the petty whispers and giggles from the girls, climbed the trees, displaying our mating feathers in acts of bravery and daring. Then, we would while away the hours watching and talking as the lazy sun scattered diamonds on Loch Ascog’s smooth surface as it dipped over the horizon.

At the same time, observing the farmhand in the distance gathering the hay.  I breathed in the evening sweet grass fused with dung, a welcome odour. Eventually, we would return to our homes when our stomachs or weariness overpowered. I would sit in the deck chair listening to the pneumatic, rhythmic hiss of milking machinery relieving the bovines of their day's takings.

                                                                                                              Jim, 1970

Postscript 2023

          Five decades on, I often return to that tree, reminiscing on the memories we have shared under its foliage as its ‘very being has become entwined with mine in an unlikely kinship.

“Allow the little children, 

and don’t forbid them to come to me; 

for the Kingdom of Heaven 

belongs to ones like these.” 

 Matthew 19:13 (WEB).

 I was staying at Loch Awe in Scotland’s west coast at the weekend — certainly, a contrast from the image above. But allow me to explain. First may I say that I am non-political; I do not vote for reasons that I am a Christian and do not dare to share in the sins of others.

Anyway, with that explained I will continue with my story. On Saturday evening we took a drive and eventually  entered Inverawe Country Park and smokery, it’s a place you could miss with the blink of an eye. But there, apart from the pretty walk, we found this lovely café where we stopped for coffee.

Having studied literature at university, I was in my element. The bookshelves were filled with many of the classics. But it was the poems that were dispersed around the room that caught my attention and there was one that made me weep. It was called Oh Rascal Children of Gaza by Khalid Juma

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GM3PhZM3OAs

I cannot fathom the pain a child experiences when they suddenly lose their family.

Meanwhile, I witness petty arguments on the street. Silly bickering within families. Disputes in the workplace over insignificant, fleeting issues. when our attention and energy is better focused on the critical matters affecting our world, such as every child's right to grow up in peace and security.

Image by https://unsplash.com/@simon_alibert

A friend, who was a charity worker that looked after the needs of refugees had a Chinese man walk into his office one day. The man never spoke English, so, with a video link to a professional translator they were able to answer the man’s query.

“Can you tell me, what happens when we die?” was his question.

The Chinese man is not unique. We all ask that question and believe me; the thought becomes more frequent as you get older.

Why is there something rather than nothing. Why is this lump of matter and electrical charge we call the brain aware of itself? Why are we so unique that we can explore these matters? This is the boundary of science. These are questions that will never be answered by science. Despite the grandiose claims, we are nowhere near answering these questions. The reason being, science is not the arbitrator of the metaphysical.

We have an assurance penned in John 5:24-29, 

Most certainly I tell you, the hour comes, and now is, when the dead will hear the Son of God’s voice; and those who hear will live.  For as the Father has life in himself, even so he gave to the Son also to have life in himself.  He also gave him authority to execute judgment, because he is a son of man.  Don’t marvel at this, for the hour comes in which all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and will come out; those who have done good, to the resurrection of life; and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment. (WEB).